Jun 17, 2014

This Cuban inspired dish is made with shredded chicken breast cooked in the crock pot, then sauteed with bell peppers, onions, cumin and lots of Latin flavor!

Cuban cuisine is a favorite of mine and Ropa Vieja, which translates as "old clothes" is a dish I love. It's traditionally made with shredded skirt steak, and served over white rice and fried plantains.

I created this lighter version a few years ago using lean chicken breast instead, sometimes I even use boneless skinless thighs or a combination of both. I like to serve it with baked tostones (plantain chips) and a salad. Leftovers make a delicious burrito bowl (I love Chipotle!) served over brown Cilantro lime rice, Southwestern black bean salad, lettuce and shredded cheese.

Place chicken, 1 onion, tomato, carrot, and 2 cloves of garlic into crock pot. Add just enough water to cover, add bay leaves and salt and cook high for 4 hours until the chicken is tender. When done, remove chicken and shred with two forks; set aside. Reserve the broth.

In a large deep skillet, heat the olive oil over medium heat. Add the remaining garlic, onions, green peppers, and red peppers. Cook about 3 to 4 minutes, or until soft. Stir in the cooked chicken, tomato sauce, white wine, and about 3/4 cup of the reserved broth to create a sauce. Season with cumin, garlic powder, salt, and pepper. Cover and simmer on low for about 8 to 10 minutes, adding more broth and seasoning if needed. Makes 4 cups.

you come up with the BEST recipes...everything looks mouth watering good...I'm making the garlic shrimp, habernero rice & asian meatballs this week...i'm definitely going to be attempting the above as well...thank you so much for all the work you put into this...KAT

Hi Gina! Love your site. I happened to have everything on hand for this, so at the moment it's cooking in the crockpot. I tried your eggplant parmesan last night and it was awesome! Thank you so much for posting all your wonderful recipes! I've lost 80 lbs. in the past year and your recipes have been a tremendous help!

First of all, my wife and I love your recipes. We need both hands to count how many times we've used your recipes. Nom nom nom!

This dish was great! My wife doesn't like chunky veggies so I minced the red bell(no green), onion and two garlic cloves before they went in to the skillet. Can't forget the cayenne either. We like it spicy. Wow, it was tough to stop after one plate. Definitely a keeper. Thanks for helping us use our crockpot.

I don't recall the weight on the chicken, sorry!There are lots of rice and bean recipes, there's arroz con gandules, Puerto Rican Beans and Brazilian Black Beans. Look under the Latin Recipes on the right.

I threw all of the everything listed above in the crock pot for 7 hours on high. I did not discard the veggies like Gina wrote and it came out delicious. We kept the juice seperate and drained the chicken and veggies. We put it on White rice and drizzle the juice over the mixter. We love it, it's a bit sweet and not spicy. I tripled the recipe to feed 12.

I tried this recipe last night and can I just say... YUMMM!!! This is just the kind of food I like. Lots of flavor and easy to prepare. Have a bent toward Latin food, too. :) I served it with no fat refried beans and corn tortillas. Was a big hit here, even for my "I don't like chicken" daughter! Thanks!

DH and I had this for dinner tonight and it was awesome! We were looking to try something different and this recipe really fit the bill....very tasty and healthy. Today we had it with rice and beans....tomorrow in a tortilla shell. Very versitile!

Keep the wonderful recipes coming. I made this tonight with the Cilantro Lime Rice and loved every bite. I didn't have white wine so I substituted cooking Sherry. Food like this keeps me from buying take out for lunch the next day!

I made this last night with the Cilantro Lime Rice and the Corn Salsa (I basically assembled it like a Chipotle Burrito Bowl)...My husband and I BOTH loved it so much!!! We will definitely be making it again!!

The flavors reminded me a lot of Chicken Tortilla Soup without all the broth.

Gina I LOVE your blog and your recipes look delish! I'm printing out a bunch to take home and try. However, I am NOT a cook and therefore not that knowledgeable on some stuff... such as "reserved broth". What is it? Where can I find it? Sorry if I sound ignorant! If anyone else can help me answer this too, feel free! LOL!

I am latina so I love tasty food. You certainly have that "yumm" in your recipes that I long for. I cook lots of my own dishes, but now I need a plan to stay on WW and your recipes don't dissapoint! Mucho thank you!!

Aww =) See, now I know where you get that FLAVOR from LOL. Thanks so much for all your work and making us happier to be in the kitchen! We are stationed in Okinawa now and missing NY because hubby and I have very eclectic taste buds --as I am sure you do! But now I can make all kinds of new dishes and not have to settle for Okinawan cuisine alone. Cheers!

Same here =) Soemtimes I need to point at a picture and show them what I want. I prefer the "ticket" restaurants where we place the order, pay the vending machine and the meal is served. By the way, I made the chicken ropa vieja, cilantro rice ( love cilantro) and the salad to go with it. DELISH! My 18 month old loved the rice as well! Thank you!!

From the UK - Gina your website is mega and I have recommended it to members of my WW group. I love cooking and your recipes are great (even if I have to do a lil conversion and adaption!) thank you :-)

Glad you all like this, it's awesome of course with flank steak too. Not sure off the top of my head, the point difference, but maybe I'll make it and post it. I have some grass fed flank from Hearst farms in my freezer waiting to be used.

I'm not really familiar Latin food, but this looked so delicious and versatile, I tried it today. It is unbelievably delicious! The crockpot and spices add a crazy amount of flavor to the chicken, there was seriously not a bland bite. I put it in a wrap, which (of course) promptly disintegrated on me, but it was so good that I really didn't mind tearing off chunks of tortilla, scooping up some chicken and just shoveling it in my mouth. Such a terrific recipe and amazing website-- I will definitely be back often!

I am a Latin American woman who is currently doing WW. Your recipes are amazing. The flavors are spot on and you would never know these recipes are low fat/low calories. I have tried several of your latin recipes, including this one, and they have all been phenomenal. My husband, born in Honduras, has fallen in love with your dishes. Thanks so much!

That makes me so happy Kimberly. Latin cuisine is one of my favorites, and growing up eating Latin food and having family living in so many different Latin countries, I've had the good fortune to know how good South and Central American should taste!

Okay so this is my SECOND time making this in the past week. First time it was a hit. I dont drink so i skipped the wine, and use the broth from the crockpot, also added garlic paste, and pinch of cumin on each chicken breast in crockpot. I made the chicken and pepper/onion mixture and froze half for next week. this is amazing and i only used less than a tsp of oil just to fry up the peppers amazing, with sw bean and cilantro rice yum. thank you so much gina! with a 9 month old its hard to cook let alone come up with easy, heatlhy meals. thank you thank you thank you! pls keep the recipies coming

This was delicious!!! I will never attempt to poach chicken and shred again. It fell apart in the crockpot! This was a hit at the dinner table, and served over whole grain brown rice. The Southwestern Corn / Bean Salad was also delicious. Thanks for posting!

Thanks, Gina-I was out buying the chicken when you answered my question. The butcher said 2of the chicken breast halves were quite large so I only bought 2 (11/2 pounds for 2) I hope that's going to work. Also bought the pork for The Pernil. We r going to eat healthy this week. Thanks For answering about the wine substitution. I suppose that will always be my substitution whenever it calls for wine. I've been on WW since the beginning in New York and wherever else I lived. Always wanted to find a way to prepare good Cuban food without the consequences. Your website has inspired me again.

Wow this was good. Even my picky 3 year old loved it.I hope you don't mind, I posted this on my blog - with full credit of course! http://nancysrecipebox.blogspot.com/2011/03/chicken-ropa-vieja-5-points-plus.html

Yesterday I made five new Latin inspired recipes from your website - I just found your blog last week and couldn't wait to try some things out. This was one of them, and I served it with the Cuban black beans, the habenero, lime, cilantro rice (with brown basmati) and the aji picante. My husband said it was the best meal he's ever eaten.

we had this tonight and the chicken was so moist and juicy!!! We made a few changes to make the kids happy, and we ate ours with whole wheat tortillas, organic shredded lettuce, fat free cheddar, fat free sour cream and a dab of taco sauce....YUMMY!!

Gina, I love your blog, I recently discovered it a few weeks ago. I consider myself a foodie but never really used to make my own meals. But now that I'm doing Weight Watchers, cooking helps me easily count my points. I love Chipotle and today I made this dish, with the cilantro lime rice and corn with lime salsa....I was so excited to make my own burrito bowl. I've also made other dishes, your blog inspires me to cook more and everything I've made has been AWESOME! Thanks so much for these Chipotle inspired recipes, I plan to make the barbacoa beef in a few days. I'm SO excited.

I used this method today to make filling for chicken soft tacos, but I cheated a little and put a teaspoon of liquid smoke in the slow cooker with the other juices, so the chicken has a nice slightly smoky flavor (though I'm sure that isn't traditional, still it's delicious!) I've been trying a new recipe from your site nearly every day for the last two weeks and all of them have been fantastic! Thanks!

Not sure what I did wrong- the chicken came out of the crockpot extremely bland, and it never seemed to pick up much flavor from the sauce. Actually, the sauce was pretty bland. I had to pour a ton of cumin and garlic powder in, and we still ended up using a lot of salsa to give it some taste. I followed the recipe exactly as written (I'm not an adventurous cook!)

Hi I plan to make this dish in the crockpot and the directions are confusing for me at the end... I have the chicken, water, garlic, tomato, onion, and carrot in the crockpot... so now in the skilled I put the rest of the onion, peppers, and garlic powder? Plus the sauce and wine? Just making sure... thanks

I made this last night, used the stove top method since I didn't have the time for the crock pot version. It was so easy! The chicken came out so moist and tender. I added a can of rotel (diced tomatoes with jalapenos) to the final version and a little sriracha for additional heat. Such a great meal and for so little points. This will be my lunch for the next few days and I'm actually looking forward to it. Thanks for all the great recipes!!

Gina, I just found your site yesterday and I'm going to try this recipe this week. My mother used to make this dish for me when I was little girl but in Brazil we say "roupa velha" same meaning :-) hmmm good memories!!! Everything here looks and sounds delicious I'm sure i'm coming back for more recipes!! Thanks

This is an amazing recipe...I have made it several times! This time I used a can of cilantro lime rotel instead of tomatoes(since that is what I have)...and we put this on tacos...best shredded chicken tacos ever!

I made this and the flavor was delicious. My only problem is that when I cooked the chicken and veggies on the stove top with the sauce,wine and broth. I feel like it was a lot of liquid. I took it out and drained some of the liquid and put it back in the skillet and it's still sort of wet. Should it be cooked down in the end so that all of the liquid is evaporated?

I just made this for dinner today. I put it over a salad of romaine, tomatoes, carrots onions and fresh cilantro and squeezed a bit of lime over it. It's the first time I got my boyfriend to eat a salad for dinner. Very delicious! I even saved the extra "broth" and used it when i made my black bean soup. I will make this again for sure.

My wife and I are lucky enough to be in a test market for Taco Bell's new Cantina Menu. They are trying to compete with places like Qdoba and Moe's by offering a fresh type of dish. They must have gotten the inspiration from your site because your burrito bowl in the pic above is identical to what we ate! The only thing missing from your bowl is the cilantro dressing which I see you also have a recipe for. Going to be trying this at home this week! I love cooking everything I've found on your site. Thanks for sharing your recipes.

Hi being British , I am not sure of the ingredient tomato sauce .. Is it as tomato ketchup , or passatta type tomatoes .. Sorry if I am being dense !! Any way brill recipes .. Am just trying to narrow them down to try ,,

I made this tonight with the cilantro rice, topped with a tablespoon of your corn salsa and a tablespoon of shredded Monterey Jack cheese. Loved it, and my husband just said, "that's a keeper". Thanks Gina. Love your site and recipes.

I haven't tried this yet but it looks and sounds amazing. I have been searching and searching for a good shredded chicken recipe. I just wanted to say THANK YOU for putting this site together and sharing all your amazing recipes. Every recipe I have tried has been fabulous! I am alsoh a fan of Chipotle and I can't wait to try this in a burrito bowl with the Cilantro Lime Rice. Thanks again!!!!

Thank you so much for this recipe! I made it yesterday along with your 2 recommendations of Cilantro lime rice & Southwestern black bean salad. It was all so delish! Made me feel like I was eating Qdoba (we don't have a Chipotle in Reno). I will be making all of this again!

I had some chicken that had to be cookd today, or I was going to have to throw it away. Low and behold, I had all the ingrediants on hand for this! This tastes like the shredded chicken that our local Mexican restaraunt uses in all their chicken dishes. (Though , I'm pretty sure they marinate it in pineapple juice first.) Oh yeah, keeping this on hand from now on.

Just finished cooking this dish, put it back in the crock pot after just to keep it warm. I know you're supposed to discard the veg after, but I added it back in. No point in wasting perfectly good veggies right?? Can't wait to have this later!!

I just love love love your blog, I've printed and tested so many of your recipes! Yesterday I made stuffed pepper soup and my housemate wouldn't stop repeating how good it was!!

Question: is there anything I can use to replace the 1/4 cup white wine, or can I simply skip it? I'm on an anti-candida diet, so no sugar, fruit, alcohol, yeast, vinegar, flour for me... the wine is a no-no :(((

Had this for dinner last night and even with my mistakes it was a hit! In a rush I forgot to add the water to cover chicken in crockpot and I didn't have the white wine. I used frozen chopped onion & pepper blend too and served it with sour cream, YUM!

I just made this tonight. It was great! My five year old LOVED it too! We ate it wrapped in whole wheat tortillas with a little sour cream. It was hard to stop at just one! I can't wait for leftovers tomorrow.

I made this yesterday for dinner. My finacé, which is beyond picky when it comes to chicken, ate it just fine. I loved it and can't wait to have some of the leftovers for lunch today.

To make this more authentically Cuban, I put in el cheapo Latin white cooking wine, which is what we (Cubans) use when cooking. I didn't have a tomato on hand, so I added a can of diced and seasoned tomato (drained). I kept on adding more garlic powder, cumin, salt, and pepper during the last step. We love garlic, so I added three smashed cloves to the crock pot, and three minced cloves during the sauteing step. Finally, I added a whole (small) can of unseasoned tomato sauce, instead of the 1/2 cup suggested.

Thanks so much for the recipe! I will definitely be making this again.

This is FABULOUS! The only thing I will do different the next time will be to make it the day before. Hubby took the leftovers to work today and he said that it was so much better than it was the night before. There is nothing like coming home to something cooked that lingers in the air....so homey! :) I served it on a bed of shredded lettuce along with chili powder seasoned chickpeas, but I was thinking of some other possibilities that would work with this such as tortillas or rice fluffed with mango and spices. No matter what I do, it's now a keeper! :)

made this tonight.. everyone had 2nd's, added in corn and black beans; used lettuce leaves as a wrap and added cilantro to the rice in the rice cooker; topped off with avocado.This was the best way I've used chicken in a long time. Can't say thank you enoughLooking forward to trying more of your recipes. I am terrible at being able to accurately follow recipes so I kinda wing it, and even with winging it, delicioso!!!

Delicious!! Definitely my kind of "comfort food". =) And the leftover broth is yummy, too--can't wait to have chicken soup for lunch tomorrow. My husband and I have been making a concerted effort to eat healthier/lighter (and he recently started Weight Watchers), so I was super excited to stumble onto your Web site. Tried several recipes and haven't been disappointed yet.:) Thanks for putting together such a great site!

Made this for dinner tonight. Added black beans to the chicken and served it over brown rice. With an avocado cut up into the final dish, it was one of the most delicious things I've made from your site. Thanks for taking the time to make healthy so flavorful!

The link in this post to the Southwestern Black Bean Salad isn't working (although I can still search and find it on your site) just so you know. :-) I'm thinking I may make this recipe tomorrow for dinner.

Gina, I don't have a slow cooker. Do you think this dish can be done entirely on the stove and/or oven? Please email and let me know, and how you would change the steps. gbgaubert@gmail.com I want to make this for dinner tonight!

Gina I feel like I've commented on this, the chicken enchilada soup, and pork carnitas multiple times but thank you - your crock pot recipes are staples in our house! We have 13 month old triplets so time to do anything is limited:) Thanks for making our lives easier and for keeping convenience healthy. The kids are starting to love your recipes too!-Lauren

Going to try making this tomorrow.....sounds so yummy!! Gina - wanted to thank you for all of your time and effort into making delicious recipes that are light and healthy and low enough carb for me to eat. I was diagnosed with Diabetes a few months ago and am so thankful I stumbled upon your website as it has helped me lose 22 pounds so far, eat healthier and really enjoy cooking. Also, most of your recipes I have tried are super easy and quick which is a HUGE bonus! I have liked everything I've tasted so far - SO great to be able to eat healthy and have it taste like we are at a restaurant! Our favorite so far is Crockpot Picadillo!!!! Thank you, thank you!!